The Geocacher Who Went Up a Hill ... EarthCache
Hidden : 1/6/2013
Difficulty:
1.5 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size: other (other)

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Geocache Description:

... But Came Down a Mountain

Castle Hill is an isolated pink granite monolith standing in the heart of the north Queensland city of Townsville. It rises to a height of 286 metres (938 ft) above sea level and dominates the city skyline.  According to Townsville locals cartographers define the monolith as a hill because it is short of the required 1000 feet in height required to be a “mountain”

An inselberg is an isolated hill, knob, ridge, outcrop, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a surrounding plain. Granite rocks are plutonic igneous rocks, which were formed by slowly cooling pockets of magma trapped beneath the earth's surface. Granites are typically a hard rock with visible crystalline texture, rich in quartz and feldspar. Granite is the most common igneous rock of the Earth’s crust. An outcrop of granite on the earth's surface requires some kind of erosion to expose the buried material. Castle Hill is an inselberg of Carboniferous-Permian origins, rising abruptly from the younger Quaternary coastal plain.



To claim this earth cache you need to have the following earth science tasks validated by email or message.
->Describe the erosion process and rate occurring on Castle Hill?
->Estimate the time period since Castle Hill was Castle Mountain?  (Assume a linear erosion rate)
->Describe the crystal structure of the pink granite?
->Estimate the Mohr's hardness of the pink granite?

In your log can you suggest a solution for turning Castle Hill into a mountain?

Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Gb rfgvzngr gur rebfvba engr purpx gur pbzzba fvmr bs tevg naq teniry ba gur uvyy.

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)


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